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Board of Directors

Board of Directors

Accion's board of directors brings to the organization diverse experience from both the private and public sectors, including commercial and investment banking, corporate and nonprofit management, and international community development.

Advisor to the Board

Board of Directors Bios

Diana Taylor

Managing Director

Wolfensohn Fund Management LP

Diana Taylor joined Wolfensohn Fund Management LP, a strategic consulting and investment firm, in 2007, prior to which she served as New York State superintendent of banks and chairwoman of the New York State Banking Board. Before her government service, she worked in the private sector as vice president for KeySpan Energy and as an investment banker with Smith Barney, Lehman Brothers and Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette. Diana serves on the boards of Citigroup, Brookfield Asset Management and Sotheby's. She also serves on several charitable boards. She chairs the boards of Accion International and the Hudson River Park Trust. Other board memberships include the New York Women’s Foundation, the YMCA of Greater New York, Dartmouth College, the Mailman School of Public Health and the International Women's Health Coalition. She is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Economic Club of New York. She earned her AB from Dartmouth College, her MBA from the Columbia School of Business, and her MPH from the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia.

Henry Miller

COO

Goodman Media International, Inc.

Henry Miller has more than two decades of experience in communications and public affairs, managing the reputations, visibility and public policy issues of corporations, government agencies and nonprofit organizations, both domestically and internationally.
In addition, Mr. Miller has served as a managing director at Ogilvy Adams & Rinehart (now Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide), one of the top ten public relations firms in the world; as CEO of New York ’92, the nonpartisan nonprofit organization created to manage New York City’s hosting of the 1992 Democratic National Convention; and as deputy chief administrative officer of the City of Atlanta, responsible for external affairs.
Mr. Miller holds MA and BA degrees in sociology from the University of Virginia.

Titus Brenninkmeijer

President

Solgenix LLC

Titus Brenninkmeijer is a social entrepreneur whose work has focused on assisting global entrepreneurs to grow sustainable businesses through the development of commercially viable applications. Mr. Brenninkmeijer’s experience in international retail allows him to leverage deep knowledge of consumer behavior and trends to help his partners successfully target current and future consumer needs. Before entering the solar energy industry in 2003, he spent twenty-five years in the retail industry in the UK, Germany, Spain, Brazil and the US. In 2005, Mr. Brenninkmeijer founded Solgenix, an investment company with a focus on privately held solar energy companies in developed as well as emerging markets. He is also a co-founding member and sits on the steering committee of the REDCO Alliance (Rural Energy Delivery Companies), a group of 13 solar energy entrepreneurs from Latin America, Africa and Asia. Mr. Brenninkmeijer serves as chairman of the Energy Access Foundation, which he co-founded in 2006. The EAF is a nonprofit organization devoted to providing support and funding for innovation in clean energy delivery in the rural marketplace in emerging markets. He is a board member and partner of Phatenergy, a company focused on the installation of solar systems in Southern California, and Pod Generating Group, a Canadian company installing utility-scale solar systems in Canada and the US. He is a board member of TechnoServe, a nonprofit that works with agricultural entrepreneurs in emerging markets. Mr. Brenninkmeijer holds a BA from Boston College and an MBA from the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley, and resides with his family in a solar-powered home in Pasadena, California.

Tara Kenney

Managing Director

Deutsche Asset Management, Inc.

Tara Kenney is a managing director for Deutsche Asset Management, Inc., and has acted as a portfolio manager for Scudder's Latin American equity product for over seven years. Ms. Kenney's group has approximately US $1.5 billion under management in Latin America. In March of 2001, she was made a co-manager of Scudder's Emerging Markets equity products. Prior to joining Scudder, Ms. Kenney was employed by Bankers Trust in their Latin America Merchant Bank from 1987 to 1994. She was involved with the firm’s corporate finance activities in the Andean region, including mergers and acquisitions and capital markets activities.
Ms. Kenney earned an MBA in finance from New York University's Stern School of Business in 1991. She holds bachelor’s degrees in political science and Spanish from the University of Notre Dame and did post-graduate work in economics at the Pontifica Universidad Catolica in Peru.

Paul Tregidgo

Managing Director

Credit Suisse, Investment Banking Division

Paul Tregidgo is a managing director of Credit Suisse in the investment banking division, based in New York. He is vice chairman – debt capital markets, responsible for the international DCM business, across investment grade and emerging markets globally. Mr. Tregidgo also leads the firm's global government client segment, which is charged with the integrated delivery of the firm's expertise and capabilities to government clients worldwide, and is a member of the firm's Emerging Markets Council. Previously, he was head of global and emerging debt capital markets at Credit Suisse, and, from 1995–2000, head of Latin American debt capital markets. During his career at Credit Suisse, Mr. Tregidgo has served on the global investment banking and fixed income operating committees.
Mr. Tregidgo has originated and executed numerous groundbreaking financings in the international capital markets for European, Asia–Pacific and Latin American Governments, agencies, banks and corporations. In particular, in the emerging markets, over the last 20 years Mr. Tregidgo has been active with borrowers around the world opening new markets as this dynamic sector has developed.
Prior to joining Credit Suisse First Boston (as then was) in London in 1985, Mr. Tregidgo practiced international financial law in London and Hong Kong. Mr. Tregidgo obtained his law degree from Downing College Cambridge. He is currently a member of the Advisory Board of the Center for Financial Inclusion at Accion.

Barbara Lucas

Partner

Luness Partners, LLC

Barbara Lucas is a securities and banking lawyer with more than 25 years of experience in law, business and government. A former partner and chairperson of the banking department at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, Ms. Lucas has represented major U.S. and foreign banks, broker-dealers, primary dealers, derivatives companies and hedge funds on a wide range of banking, securities, corporate, compliance and governance issues.
Prior to joining Cadwalader, she was general counsel to what was then known as Citicorp's Investment Bank, with responsibility for oversight of all legal and compliance functions in Citi's wholesale securities, commodities, derivatives, structured finance and foreign currency businesses in the U.S. and OECD countries. She also served as chief counsel to the CFTC's Division of Enforcement and director of its Office of Policy Review, as well as special counsel to the SEC's Division of Corporation Finance, in charge of its Corporate Governance Task Force and various regulatory initiatives, including actions culminating in passage of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. A pioneer in the derivatives business and a long-time adviser to all types of financial services companies, she is the author of numerous articles appearing in a wide range of publications.
Ms. Lucas received her undergraduate degree in English from Cornell University and her JD from the Washington College of Law at American University.

Thomas C. Barry

Founder and CEO

Zephyr Management

Thomas Barry is the president and chief executive officer of Zephyr Management, L.P., an investment management company he founded in 1994. Zephyr sponsors 13 specialized investment funds with approximately US $2 billion in committed capital. Zephyr’s private equity funds invest in Mexico, Africa (Kingdom Zephyr Africa Management Company) and India, and in debt of housing and healthcare facilities in the U.S. Zephyr’s marketable securities funds invest in stock markets of developing countries. Prior to founding Zephyr, Mr. Barry was president and CEO of Rockefeller & Co., the investment management arm of the Rockefeller family, from 1983 to 1993. Previously, Mr. Barry was employed by T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc., from 1969 to 1982. Mr. Barry received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1969 and an undergraduate degree from Yale University in 1966, where he majored in Latin American studies. He is a chartered financial analyst. Mr. Barry is active in numerous nonprofit institutions. Currently, he serves as a director/ trustee of TechnoServe, Trickle-Up and the Kucetekela Foundation. He was a trustee of Princeton-in-Africa from 2004 to 2007.

Nancy Birdsall

President

Center for Global Development

Nancy Birdsall is the founding president of the Center for Global Development. Prior to launching the center, Dr. Birdsall served for three years as senior associate and director of the Economic Reform Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Her work at Carnegie focused on issues of globalization and inequality, as well as on the reform of the international financial institutions.
From 1993 to 1998, Dr. Birdsall was executive vice president of the Inter-American Development Bank, the largest of the regional development banks, where she oversaw a US $30 billion public and private loan portfolio. Before joining the Inter-American Development Bank, she spent 14 years in research, policy, and management positions at the World Bank, most recently as director of the Policy Research Department.
Dr. Birdsall is the author, co-author, or editor of more than a dozen books and over 100 articles in scholarly journals and monographs, published in English and Spanish. Shorter pieces of her writing have appeared in dozens of U.S. and Latin American newspapers and periodicals. Dr. Birdsall holds a PhD from Yale University, a master's from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a BA from Newton College of the Sacred Heart.

Roberto Dañino

Deputy Chairman of the Board

Hochschild Mining, PLC

Roberto Dañino is a Peruvian attorney who currently serves as deputy chairman of Hochschild Mining PLC, a gold and silver producer listed in London, and chairman of Fosfatos del Pacífico, listed in Lima. He also serves as independent director in the boards of various corporations and non-profits in Peru, South Africa, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States.
He has practiced as an international corporate lawyer for more than 30 years, most recently as a partner at Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering LLP, now Wilmer Hale LLP, where he headed the Latin American Practice.
In the public sector, he served as prime minister of Peru, ambassador of Peru to the United States and, early in his career, as secretary general of economy, finance and trade.
In the multilateral world, he was the founding general counsel of the Inter-American Investment Corporation (IIC), the private sector affiliate of the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington, DC. He later served as senior vice president and general counsel of the World Bank Group and as secretary general of ICSID, the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes.
He is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the Catholic University of Peru. He is married to Pauline Beck, and they have four sons.

Russell Faucett

General Partner

Barrington Partners

Russell Faucett is the general partner of Barrington Partners, an investment company that trades debt and equity securities of public companies in financial difficulty. Prior to his current activities, he was a general partner of an investment banking company for middle-market companies, an advisor to several major California commercial banks, an executive vice president of a commercial finance company, and president of a venture capital company.
In addition to his business and investment activities, Mr. Faucett works with several nonprofit organizations, as a member of their board of directors, assisting them in strategic planning and financial management. Mr. Faucett graduated with distinction from Pomona College with a bachelor of arts in physics and obtained a master of science in industrial management from MIT.

John Heimann

Founding Chairman

Financial Stability Institute

Former U.S.

Comptroller of the Currency

Founding Chairman, Financial Stability Institute Former U.S. Comptroller of the Currency John Heimann’s career has spanned both the private and public sectors. He is senior advisor to the Financial Stability Institute (FSI), of which he was the founding chairman in 1999. The FSI is a joint initiative of the Swiss-based Bank for International Settlements and the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, whose mission is to promote better and more independent supervision of the banking, capital markets and insurance industries by supervisory authorities around the globe, primarily for supervisors of transitional and emerging growth economies. From 1984 to 1999, Mr. Heimann acted as chairman of the Financial Institutions Group of Merrill Lynch & Company, and also served as a member of the firm’s executive committee. Prior to that, Mr. Heimann served as United States Comptroller of the Currency. In this capacity, he was a member of the board of directors of the FDIC and was acting chairman for one year. He chaired the Federal Financial Institutions Examinations Council. Prior to becoming Comptroller, Mr. Heimann was appointed superintendent of banks of New York State and commissioner of housing of Community Renewal of New York State. In 1967, he was a founding partner of the private equity firm of Warburg, Pincus LLC. He is a director and trustee of the Urban Assembly; treasurer and trustee of the Nasher Foundation; director of the American Ditchley Foundation; and a member of the Group of Thirty. Additionally, he is a member of the boards of directors of Interaudi Bank and Newsmith Capital Group. Mr. Heimann is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Joseph Hill

Managing Director & Head of Legal and Compliance

for Latin America and Iberia, BlackRock

Joseph Hill is currently a managing director and the head of legal and compliance for Latin America and Iberia at BlackRock, the world's largest asset manager. Prior to joining BlackRock, Mr. Hill served as the principal lawyer for Latin America at MetLife for six years and J.P. Morgan Chase for 12 years. Previously, Mr. Hill was an associate at Mayer Brown in New York and Uría & Menéndez in Spain. He is admitted to practice in both jurisdictions.
He is a member of the New York City Bar Association, where he has served on the Executive Committee and chaired the Committee on Inter-American Affairs. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He holds a BA, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, from Fordham University, a JD from Columbia Law School and MBA degrees from Columbia and London Business Schools. Mr. Hill is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.

Ron Hoge

Chairman and CEO

Pinnacle Engines, Inc.

Ron Hoge is a venture advisor for New Enterprise Associates and serves as a director and consultant to several clean tech startups in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is currently chairman and CEO of Pinnacle Engines, Inc. a new ultra efficient, low emission internal combustion engine company. Mr. Hoge has over 40 years of business experience with executive leadership roles in seven different companies on three continents from Fortune 500 firms to venture-backed startups. He was president of Cummins Brasil S.A, president and chief executive officer of Onan Corporation (now Cummins Power Generation), president and chief executive of Magnetek, and president of a $1.5 billion aerospace division of Allied Signal. Since 2000, he has focused his leadership efforts on a variety of venture-backed startups. Mr. Hoge has served on a dozen public and non-profit boards over the years. In the non-profit world, he is currently a trustee at the San Francisco Asian Art Museum and a trustee of the EARTH University Foundation.
Mr. Hoge has a BA in mathematics from Amherst College and an MBA in marketing from Stanford University. He speaks Portuguese from his many years living in Brazil.

Michael Chu

Senior Lecturer

Harvard Business School

Co-Founder and Managing Director

Ignia

Michael Chu is the co-founder and managing director of Ignia, an investment firm, and a senior lecturer at the Harvard Business School, joining the Initiative on Social Enterprises. Previously, Mr. Chu was president and CEO of Accion for six years. Prior to joining the staff, he served on the Board of Accion since 1989. Mr. Chu has extensive private-sector experience and serves on the board of various private companies. He graduated with an AB from Dartmouth College and received an MBA with highest distinction (Baker Scholar) from Harvard Business School.

Robert Helander

Managing Partner

InterConsult LLP

Robert Helander is currently managing partner at Kaye, Scholer, Fierman, Hays & Handler. From 1965 to 1976 he worked for International Basic Economy Corporation (IBEC), where he served as group vice president, general counsel, and president and director of several companies associated with IBEC. Mr. Helander is affiliated with a number of organizations with international interest, including the Council on Foreign Relations and the Fund for Multinational Management Education. Mr. Helander is also director of the Pan American Society, the Fundacion San Martin de Porres, the Americas Society and the International Center.Mr. Helander graduated from Amherst College and Harvard Law School.

Daniel Martin

Associate Professor

Pace University

Daniel Martin is an associate professor at Pace University in New York. He was formerly the president and COO of Milestone Scientific and the president and CEO of E-Z-EM Corporation. Prior to E-Z-EM, Mr. Martin was the president of Sterling Latina and Sterling Europe, with Sterling Drug, Inc. in New York. Before that he also was president and 50 percent owner of the Howland Martin Corporation in New York. Mr. Martin is a board member of the American Chamber of Commerce in Colombia and Peru, as well as the Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association of Peru.
Mr. Martin received a BA in economics from Cornell University and an MBA from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business.

Álvaro Rodríguez Arregui

Managing Partner

Ignia

Mr. Rodríguez Arregui is the founder and chief executive of Ignia, an enterprise building investment firm based in Monterrey, Mexico, focused on investing in and developing commercial enterprises serving the base of the socio-economic pyramid. Formerly, he served as CFO of Vitro, one of the largest glass manufacturers in the world, and of Grupo Salinas’ retail arm, Elektra. He is one of the founders of Banco Azteca, among the two largest banks in Mexico in terms of coverage, and also worked at Accion.
Mr. Rodríguez Arregui sits on the boards of Banco Compartamos, an Accion partner microfinance institution; Harvard’s David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies; LASPAU; IMEF (Mexican Institute for Finance Executives); and UNIDOS Lo Lograremos, A.C., a Mexican nonprofit dedicated to the social integration of mentally and physically disabled persons, where he also serves as chair.
Mr. Rodríguez Arregui holds a M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School and a B.S. in economics from the Instituto Technológico Autónomo de México (ITAM). In 2005, he was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.

John Scott

Retired Corporate Vice President

CPC International

John Scott is a retired corporate vice president of CPC International, where he was employed for forty years. While there, he was responsible for the company’s capital expenditures as well as the coordination of its computer systems worldwide. Earlier, he managed businesses for the company in many Latin American countries. Mr. Scott is a graduate of Princeton University.

Nancy Sherwood Truitt

President

Truitt Enterprises, Inc.

Nancy Truitt is senior advisor to the Tinker Foundation Inc. and president of Truitt Enterprises Inc., a development consulting company. Ms. Truitt has more than 35 years of experience in economic and political policy issues in the developing world, working with both multinational corporations and nonprofit organizations.
Ms. Truitt received a BA from Stanford University and an MBA in management and international business from New York University. She serves as chair of the Board of the Collaborative Arts Project 21 and as a director of the Yorktown Land Trust.

Sean Foote

Professional Faculty

UC Berkeley, Haas School of Business

Sean Foote has been a venture capitalist investing in early stage companies since 1998. He was most recently a Managing Director at Labrador Ventures, investors in more than 100 technology companies including Hotmail and Pandora.
Before venture investing, Sean was a management consultant with Boston Consulting Group, working in a wide range of industries such as telecom, computers, healthcare, banking, and automotive on topics ranging from strategic alliances to Internet strategies. Sean also worked as a systems engineer for AT&T Bell Laboratories, developing artificial intelligence systems for testing the most complicated telecommunications networks.
Philanthropically interested in education, social investment and microfinance, Sean is founder of Community Promise, an educational focused nonprofit. He is on the boards of directors of Freedom From Hunger and Silicon Valley Microfinance Network, and is the co-founder of Toniic, an angel investor group for impact investors, and Village Capital, a combination of YPO style entrepreneur support and business plan competition style equity investment. Sean is also on the Center for Financial Inclusion Faculty Council and the Frontier Investments Advisory Council.
Sean is on the Professional Faculty of the University of California's Haas School of Business. He teaches Venture Capital and Private Equity as well as the Ashoka Innovation award winning Microfinance Simulcast, which is broadcast in real time to more than 75 business schools around the country. He has also taught classes on entrepreneurship at the University of Michigan's Business School, University of Virginia's Darden School of Business and University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business.
Sean received his undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Missouri Rolla (1988), and his MBA from the University of Virginia's Darden Graduate School of Business (1993), where he received the Shermett Award granted to the top 3% of students.
He has been on the US National Amateur Triathlon Team and is a singer songwriter (www.myspace.com/seanfoote). For random blog entries, you can visit his blog at http://seanfoote.wordpress.com.